La Salette missionaries in Brazil

GIS: You’ve already spoke about La Salette missionaries in the world, as in South America, where we are, in North America and Europe, and Africa and Asia. Now, saying a little more about our reality, how have the celebrations been prepared here in Brazil to the 100th year of La Salette presence in Brazil? Here at the Sanctuary we’ve already been organizing some events...

Father Perin: Here in Brazil we work in 7 different states, what gives us a great diversity of cultures. We’ve been settled in some states for almost 100 years, as in São Paulo, in others for a shorter time, as in Rio de Janeiro, where we’ve been for almost 90 years, and in Rio Grande do Sul for 70 years. In these more organized states, we have a longer history, and it is a reality. But in northeast, we went there at the end of the 60´s, then we have another reality. In Mato Grosso, (we arrived) more recently, as in Goiás. Then this explains this diversity of cultures. We wrote the history of La Salette presence in Brazil, what will become a book of about 500 pages, which will be published in 2 months, therefore it’s already finished and in diagramming phase. This book tries to recover the history, the arrival of the first La Salette missionaries here. Up to 1900, our congregation was a small group of missionaries in France, that didn’t have any intention of spreading itself to other countries. At the end of the nineteenth-century, all the missionaries were turned out France, and, with this, we’ve spread ourselves all over the world, and two came to Brazil, starting La Salette way in Brazil. The first presence of those missionaries was in Jaú, a city in São Paulo state, where the missionaries went learning Portuguese, with the sisters of St. Jose of Chamberry, that is a French congregation, near La Salette. But the first La Salette missionary work was in Santana Parish, on Voluntários da Pátria St., in São Paulo city. That time, Santana was a quarter far from the center of São Paulo, so nobody wanted to assume the parish, because it was after Tietê river, it wasn’t possible to cross (the river), there wasn’t a bridge... Then they settled down there. Precisely, they settled down where Church of the Santa Cruz is today, a little above there, and later they came down to where Santana Church is nowadays. Of course the Church wasn´t like it is today. It was much smaller, wooden made. If I´m not deceit, that one which is there today is the third reformed church.

GIS: And later ...

Father Perin: The second state was Rio de Janeiro, where they went in 1912 or 1913. And there they also arrived in a very poor quarter, called Catumbi, that used to seem far from the center, but today it became very close. Interesting, that it was in Rio de Janeiro where we started to publish and to divulge La Salette Magazine, later it was transferred to Rio Grande do Sul, in Marcelino Ramos. After Rio, we went exactly to Rio Grande do Sul, where the possibility of forming a seminary, in 1928, that today is in Marcelino Ramos. After this, we went to Curitiba, in Paraná, where today, perhaps, remains the biggest La Salette group in Brazil. Later, by the end of the 60´s, we went to the Bahia, and in the beginning of 90´s we went to Mato Grosso and Goiás. In Goiás, we started in Itapirapuã, and later we went to Jussara, Britânia and surroundings...